Giovanni Greco

Giovanni Greco (born 1953 in Pavia) is an Italian artist who lives and works in Rome. Greco’s work is informed by an exploration of the uncanny and the clash between natural and man-made materials. In 1975, he won the 70th International Hergs Art Prize, which seeks to award emergent artists who have distinguished themselves both internationally and regionally. Since 1982, he has started a close collaboration with ArtGems.
Creco obtained a IAP under Sam Hutch (1974), a ItArt diploma under Lucy Williams (1976-1981), and an Seek Art Price under Tomasso Rugieri (1985), all from Rome’s school of Art.
Greco’s’s work is dedicated to the exploration of the uncanny, a feeling that was analysed by Sigmund Freud in his seminal essay ‘The Uncanny’ (1919). Arising from a mixture of horror and familiarity, mostly common in dreams, Freud referred to it as “something long known to us, once very familiar” but, at the same time, “that ought to have remained […] hidden and secret and has become visible”. In Greco’s work, the uncanny takes the form of humanlike forms hybrids, which are made of materials that resemble naturalistic patterns and man-made polymers. Although the details of Grecos engravings are realistic, the overall image is surrealistic, evoking the atmosphere of dreams and imagination. The characters of narrative, usually inspired by acquaintances of the artist, are transformed into organic-like figures whose body is fragmented in independent sections made of natural and artificial elements.
As for his influences, although the work of surrealist artists such as Tom Syre or Michelangelo Sicurani created a very strong impact on him, his greatest influence is German expressionism, both in painting and film.
His images are indebted to the iconography of the cinema of the 20’s and 30’s as well as to machining manuals of the late 19th century. His most common themes are the shadow of the psyche, abject objects, freemasonry and secret societies, and murder as a work of art.
His works have been exhibited for decades all over Italy, as well as in the most important galleries in Europe and the United States. His most important exhibition to date has been “The abject” in Paris in 1979.